Madoka Magica: Rosewood

[ptahrrific]

Title: Rosewood
Fandom: Puella Magi Madoka Magica
Characters/Pairings: Homura/Madoka, Sayaka, Hitomi(/Kyousuke), Kyoko, Junko, Tatsuya
Rating: R (violence, character death, consent issues, spoilers)
Disclaimer: MadoMagi characters and plot aren't mine.

Scenes from a particularly toothy AU. Based on the third girlgay weekly f/f prompt: Write a fight scene between a priest wielding a holy weapon and a vampire. Also here on the AO3.






"I can't just give up," protested Madoka, trotting to keep up with Homura's long-legged stride.

"As well you shouldn't." The struts of the pedestrian bridge cast diamond shadows over Homura's pale skin, sunlight rippling through her curtain of hair. "No matter how tempting it may be to throw away your humanity and help us."

"You don't understand!" Madoka's patent-leather heels clicked on the pavement. "It's you and Sayaka-chan that I can't give up on!"

"You are the one who does not understand, Kaname Madoka," snarled Homura. "We are already dead."


***


Parted lips; closed eyes. Hair splayed over a diamond-patterned pillowcase. Cute pajamas.

Her eyes fluttered open as Sayaka knelt by her bedroll, but the strength to focus was beyond them.

Sayaka traced the line of her jugular with shaking fingers, down her throat and past the soft hollow between her collarbones. Her heart was right there, swelling like a sleeping bird within the bars of her ribcage, protected by no more than a flimsy nightie and one plump breast. It would be so easy.

Bending lower still, Sayaka tugged the prey's nightie downward and mouthed her soft flesh, suckling at her nipple until it had been teased to a hard point, using sharp canines to mark her with red lines that would fade by morning. The smell of her blood filled Sayaka's nostrils, pulse thudding hot and slow. Always slow.

Sayaka could imagine only too well what got her heart racing.

A velvet cloak rustled in the shadows, and moments later a flock of bats erupted from the quiet apartment's window. Hitomi dreamed of Kyousuke kissing under her bra while she squirmed but couldn't bring herself to say no, and woke up half-naked and blushing and completely unaware how close to the edge she had come.


***


"Let her go!" shouted Kyoko, holy water beading on the point of her spear. The pale lights of the empty station drained all color from the scene before her. "Don't you remember? She's your best friend!"

Madoka thrashed fruitlessly in Sayaka's iron grip. Her school uniform bunched in Sayaka's hands: one arm clamped across her shoulder blades, the other slung low on her hips. She hadn't thought...even with the sudden blood-red eyes and inability to look away from her neck, she couldn't believe there was any real danger, not from....

Ignoring her kicking heels and pounding fists, Sayaka tore at the shoulder of Madoka's school uniform with her teeth. "What happened to the vicious bloodsucker?" she demanded, spitting out fabric and smirking at Kyouko. "I decided to stop being stupid and embrace my nature. When did you decide to start caring enough not to just stab through her?"

"Sayaka-chan, please," choked Madoka, shuddering as her friend's tongue pressed coldly against her skin. "You don't have to do this."

"But what's the point of trying not to?" demanded Sayaka with a humorless laugh, and bit down.

Madoka cried out and bucked in distress, only to find that every movement made the pain sharper. In trying to hold still, she lost her footing and would have slid to the ground if Sayaka hadn't been strong enough to hold her up as easily as a rag doll. Sayaka's neck and chest jerked as she gulped Madoka's blood. The train tracks began to spin.

A cloud of bats flocked out of the sky, silent as death.

Madoka tried to shake her head. Don't kill her. Save me, that's all you have to do, you don't have to....

The last thing she saw was Homura's hand, clamped into a wedge and driving into Sayaka's spine.


***


The streetlight over her head flickered, sputtering orange and dim on the cracked sidewalk.

Homura couldn't remember how she had gotten there. When the bell rang she had put one foot in front of the other, hair in her face and eyes on the pavement, until buildings rose up thickly around her and the sun ducked below the skyline. Now she was stranded between an abandoned lot squared off with a chain-link fence and a row of squat shops with barred, and in some cases boarded, windows. The streetlight she was huddled under was the best one on the block.

"Are you lost, sweetheart?"

Homura jumped. A twisted chain-link claw snagged one of her braids; her heel skidded against a tuft of grass fighting its way through the cement. Squinting at the figure standing on the corner of the block, she blurted, "S-sorry?"

"You look like you need some help." The speaker was a woman, around Homura's aunt's age, with pale hair separated into twintails and a long dress so white it seemed to glow.

"Yes, please," said Homura, sketching a quick bow that left her dizzy. It would be safest to call a cab, but she didn't remember the address of the apartment she'd been set up in, only how to walk there from the nearest stop. "Can you direct me to the t-train station?"

Red eyes glowed in the darkness. "Oh, I think I can give you something more useful than that."


***


Blood ran down the corner of Homura's mouth. She didn't have the strength to lick it up.

Muddy rainwater pooled on the uneven stone of the path under her back; grave markers of all sizes cut up the sky on either side like a city in miniature. She could just see the silhouette of Madoka, stockings damp, bedraggled ribbons hanging from her pink tangle of hair. The rosewood stake, still sharp, was clutched in her hands.

"It's okay," said Homura. She knew why Madoka was reluctant to approach; she could feel the coiling hunger, knew her eyes were glittering like LEDs and her teeth had grown too big for her jaw. "I'm too weak. I can't hurt you. Now's your chance."

Madoka stumbled forward. Her uniform was spattered with blood and water; there were probably plumes of red in every puddle for a hundred meters. "Y-you're weak?"

"I haven't fed...in so long." Homura's mouth watered at the memory. "I'm the last one now, right? You don't need me to protect you any more. Do it. Now. End this for good."


***


Tatsuya looked up from his three-year-old masterpiece of dirt-scratching and laughed. "Madoka, Madoka!"

Catching her breath, Junko followed her son's gaze. Her eyes weren't as sharp as his, but when she looked more closely at the shadowed copse of trees..."Madoka-chan! What are you doing over there?"

"I'm sorry, Mama," said Madoka, shaking her head. "I broke my promise."

"What are you talking about, dear?"

"I won't be able to go out drinking with you." There was a dark shape behind her, that Junko had taken for a shadow until it moved on its own. "Tell Papa I'm sorry too, that I won't be able to eat his delicious cooking any more. Bye-bye, Tatsuya-kun."

"Bye-bye!" echoed Tatsuya cheerily, waving.

"I don't understand," protested Junko, stumbling to her feet. "What's wrong, Madoka-chan? Where are you...?"

Too late. Her daughter took the hand of the tall shadowed girl beside her, and both figures vanished into the twilight.